Area of Physics:

Research Interests

Professor Comin's research explores the rich variety of electronic phases that can be crafted and engineered in the broad class of Quantum Materials. In these systems, the complex interplay between several intertwined degrees of freedom – charge, spin, orbital, and lattice – leads to novel states of matter where symmetries are broken by the emergence of electronic orders, which include, among others, (anti)ferromagnetism, spin-density-waves, charge order, ferroelectricity, orbital order, and any combination thereof.

Light scattering techniques represent one of the finest set of tools to study and characterize symmetry breaking phenomena in solids. In particular, we use resonant x-ray scattering, which has the ability to couple to specific electronic states while accessing extended portions of reciprocal space, and thus enables the element-selective study of ordered phases at the atomic scale. Complementary to the facility-based x-ray work, we will perform Raman scattering experiments at MIT as a function of temperature, pressure, and magnetic fields.

Most importantly, we plan to integrate these two powerful methods within a pump-probe scheme where tunable photoexcitation will enable the selective manipulation of electronic orders while tracking their ultrafast time evolution in the femto-to-nanosecond time window.

Systems of interest that exhibit emergent phenomena encompass the transition metal oxides (including high-temperature superconductors, strong spin-orbit systems, multiferroics, etc.), rare earth-based compounds, and topological insulators. We will study single-crystalline materials, as well as thin films and heterointerfaces. In this context, we will also engage in the solution-based synthesis of inorganic and hybrid (mixed organic-inorganic) metal halides – a class of compounds which has recently garnered a lot of attention for optoelectronic applications, and which we plan to explore in the search for new exotic phenomena.

Biographical Sketch

Riccardo Comin joined MIT as an Assistant Professor of Physics in July 2016. He completed his undergraduate studies at the Universita’ degli Studi di Trieste in Italy, where he also obtained a M.Sc. in Physics in 2009. Later, he pursued doctoral studies at the University of British Columbia, Canada, earning a PhD in 2013. Since 2014 he is an NSERC postdoctoral fellow at the University of Toronto.

For his work using synchrotron-based x-ray scattering methods on quantum materials and electrically-tuned optoelectronic materials, he was recently selected as recipient of the Bancroft Thesis Award (2014), Fonda-Fasella Award (2014), John Charles Polanyi Prize in Physics (2015), McMillan Award (2015), and Bryan R. Coles prize (2016).